The Fragile Balance Between John and Dean Winchester
by Cameron Blacks Reads
Summary: What is the true nature of John and Dean’s relationship? This looks at how John and Dean interact with each other, starting with the night of Mary’s death. See warnings inside.
1. Chapter 1: 72 Hours

**A/N:** This is something I've been working on for a while now, after rewatching some episodes. I've got a few chapters written out already, and there could be even more, depending on what people think. Please review, good or bad.

**Warnings: **Child abuse/neglect, possible non-con

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Supernatural or its characters.

When Mary Winchester died, John was a wreck. He kept it together for long enough to ask a neighbor if he and his boys could stay at their house until they found somewhere else. The neighbor did that, of course they could stay, John herded his eldest, carrying baby Sam, up the stairs and in to the spare bedroom. John blew up the air mattress that was given to him, tucked his sons into bed and then climbed into bed himself.

He stayed there for three days. He barely had enough energy to get up and use the bathroom, and he did nothing else. He never really slept, and he didn't eat at all. He was wallowing in his grief, and he was content with doing that. He found his stages of grief were a little out of order. He was only in denial for a few moments. Then he was depressed for three days. Then he was angry for the rest of his life.

Dean, meanwhile, was taking care of his little brother in the best way that the four year old knew how. Of course, the neighbor whose house they were staying in helped, as well. But by the second day, Dean was changing diapers by himself, mixing formula, and never leaving his brother's side. Dean spoke to the neighbor and to Sammy, but never to his dad. He had tried the first day, but he decided it wasn't worth it when his dad just stared blankly at the ceiling.

By midday on the third day of their stay, with the friendly neighbor beginning to worry about John, he came bounding down the stairs. John thanked the neighbor, picked up Sammy, and went outside. Confused, Dean stood up and followed his father to where he was putting Sam into the car. Dean opened the door on the other side of his dad's precious car, and fastened himself into the car seat. John finished buckling in Sam and walked to the driver's seat without a word.

It only took a couple of hours for John to become bitter and resentful. He was driving down a two lane highway, heading god knows where, and he kept glancing in his rear view mirror at his son. His son, with his perfect green eyes, his too familiar nose, and his dirty blond hair. His son Dean, who looked exactly like his mother.

John was too filled with grief to realize that his train of thought was wrong, but he decided that he resented his son. Why had this boy, who was troublesome and irritating, survived when his beautiful and perfect wife had not? Why John did not blame Sam he couldn't say, but he decided that this must be Dean's fault. Any sane person, upon hearing John's thoughts about his eldest, should have come to the conclusion that he was not thinking rationally, and that these thoughts were insane and caused by his grief . But John was no sane person, so he did not come to that conclusion.

"Daddy?" Dean asked, after about four hours of being on the road? "Where are we going?"

"Dean, you are too old to call me that. Now shut up and go to sleep," John practically growled.

"Yes, Daddy."

"'Yes, _sir_.'" John corrected through gritted teeth.

"Yes, sir," Dean mumbled back.

Dean closed his eyes, but he did not sleep. Instead, he sat and worried. He worried about his dad, who never before said anything unkind to him. He worried about Sammy, who was only six months old and was without a mother. But mostly, he worried about his mom. Although no one had really told him so, he knew that she was dead. But Dean was worried about her, and about what would happen to her now that she was dead. Dean remembered how his mother always told him about heaven, and how angels were watching over him, but how could she know? She had never been dead before, so how did she know that it wasn't scary? Dean hoped that she would be happy, wherever she was now.


	2. Chapter 2: The First Time

They were staying in a motel somewhere in Utah a few days later. John had driven for a while, trying to come up with a plan, before he decided that he wanted to find and kill whatever it was that had taken his wife from him. But, first things first, he had to figure out what it was.

He found a motel for him and his boys, and started looking for the best stocked library. He told Dean to watch Sammy while he was gone, and Dean nodded.

Dean played with Sam, and he mixed his formula, and fed him, and he changed his diaper, and played with him some more. When it got dark and Sam started to yawn and rub his eyes, Dean put him down. Dean got himself ready for bed. He tucked himself in, and tried to fall asleep, but he was too worried about his dad. Before, his dad had always told him when he would be out past bedtime, but he hadn't said anything about that this time. Granted, a lot had changed since his mom died, so maybe he shouldn't be surprised if this had changed, as well.

Still, Dean could not fall asleep without knowing his dad was safe. He tried laying in bed and just relaxing, but he was too antsy to sit still. He tried watching cartoons, but that didn't work either. The noise of the TV helped distract him a little, but it did not put him at ease. He turned the TV off and had just strayed to pace across the room, when he heard the door creek.

Dean turned, and saw his dad shuffle into the little motel room. The first thing Dean noticed after he let himself relax, was that his dad smelled funny. He smelled thick and musky, sour and bitter and sweet all at once. It made Dean wrinkle his nose.

"Dad?" Dean managed to squeak out. John grunted, but made no other acknowledgement of his son.

"Dad? What were you doing?" Dean asked.

"Shut up, Dean. That's none of your business," John grumbled.

"Yes, Daddy," Dean answered, feeling glum.

Suddenly, Dean felt a force collide with the side of his face. He was knocked to the floor and half way across the room. Dean sat, completely stunned, and felt his cheek start to sting. Dean met his father's eye, to find him standing over him, pointing a threatening finger at him.

"You will not call me that, Dean. You will address me as sir. Understood?" John growled through gritted teeth.

"Y-yes, s-sir."

Dean fell into his bed, and cried until he fell asleep, but he did so quietly, so as not to disturb John.


	3. Chapter 3: Monsters

That's how it went for a while. John would go out, and sometimes he would come back drunk, and sometimes he wouldn't. Dean learned after a few nights like that, that if his dad came back smelling funny, Dean should get him a brown bottle out of the fridge, and go to bed. If he didn't smell weird, then Dean could ask him questions.

On the nights when Dean was allowed to be curious, he found out that his dad only drank that much when he learned about monsters.

After a while, the Winchesters began to move around. John would find different monsters that were hurting people that he would try to get rid of. John would leave for hours or days at a time, and Dean would look after Sammy. Dean learned how to make things for little Sammy to eat, and what he was big enough to make for himself. He learned how to work the tv, and he started to puzzle out the coloring and work books that his mom had gotten for him.

Dean didn't love that he had to do these things, but he didn't mind it either. He liked spending time with his little brother, and he became so much closer with Sammy than he ever thought he would be. If someone had asked Dean what good had come out of this horrible situation, he would have said getting to know Sammy better.

One night John came home, and he smelled funny, but it was stronger than usual. Dean recognized what he was to do, and he went to the little mini fridge in their hotel room, and grabbed one of the many brown bottles in there. He brought it over to his dad, and headed toward his bed.

He was almost under the covers, ready to force himself to fall asleep, when he heard, "Dean."

Dean was paralyzed. His dad never wanted anything to do with him on nights like these, so he didn't know how to procede.

"Sir?" Dean responded, his voice shaking.

"Come 'ere," John slurred. Dean shuffled over to where his dad was seated on the couch, and sat down next to him.

"Dean, I'm gonna tell what happened today. How does that sound?"

"Fine, sir," Dean shrunk down in his seat a bit.

"I was hunting a vamp, you see, and I thought it was just one. I had my machete and my dead man's blood, and I was ready to gank that sonovabitch," Dean didn't know most of the words that his dad was saying, but he stayed silent, listening patiently.

"When I got to the place that I was tracking it to, I waltzed right in there. Turns out, it was a nest of about a dozen vamps, with a good four victims in there. I was completely unprepared, but I had just walked in and announced my presence. I ganked maybe seven of the vamps, and the rest got away. But not before they killed all four of their victims. Do you know what I'd call that, Dean?"

Dean shook his head, "What?"

"A failure," John replied, standing up so that he was now towering over his son. "And do you know whose fault it is?"

Dean bit his lip and shook his head. His stomach started to feel uneasy, and he knew that something bad was about to happen, but he didn't know why.

"Yours," John spit through gritted teeth. Dean looked up at him with watery eyes, and a trembling lip, wondering how on earth this could possibly be his fault.

"Stand up and turn around, Dean," John ordered. Dean obeyed, and as John continued to speak, he heard metal clanking against metal.

"Do you know why it's your fault, Dean?" He shook his head. "If I wasn't so worried that you would fuck up your brother, then I would have been better prepared. I would have been better prepared, if you weren't such a _nuisance_!"

To emphasize that last word, Dean felt something slap him just in the center of his back. He let out a loud cry. He couldn't place what it was, but he knew that it hurt much more than his father's palm. It stung, and he felt something warm drip down from where the thing hit him.

"Dean, if you make any more noise and wake your brother, this will be much worse. Understand?" The four year old bit his lip and nodded his head.

"Good. Dean, you" slap "killed" slap "those" slap "people!" slap. "If it weren't for you, I might've been able to save those people!" Three slaps with the belt this time. "Hell, Dean, you might be the reason that Mary died! This is all your fault!"

At this point, John's words stopped making sense, but that did not mean that he stopped whipping Dean with the belt. Dean had his eyes squeezed shut, and we biting his lip hard enough to draw blood. The pain was nothing like anything he'd felt before. It was so much worse than when Dean had scraped his knees on the pavement, which he hadn't thought possible.

It went on for what felt like hours before John decided that he'd rather be passed out on the floor. As soon as he'd stopped, Dean trudged over to his bed and crawled under his covers. He laid on his stomach and pulled the sheets up to his shoulders. A moment later, he realized that the fabric made his back sting, so he pushed the sheets down to his waist.

Dean fell asleep clutching his pillow and tears streaming down his cheeks with the same two words playing through his head. _My fault. My fault. My fault_.

The next morning when Dean woke with his sheets stained with blood, John said nothing.

**A/N:** Hey guys! I have one more chapter that I am planning on writing. However, if people really like this and review it, then I will write more chapters. Let me know what you think! Thank you, lovelies.


	4. Chapter 4: When the Levee Breaks

**TRIGGER WARNING: this chapter contains non-con. Everybody please be safe. :)**

They stayed in town for a while longer, as John was determined to get those last few vampires. John would not let it go. He acted like it was his sole responsibility to save everyone in that town, and make those vamps wish they'd never been born.

And Dean stayed in the motel and looked after Sammy. He went about feeding, and changing, and playing with his baby brother while his back ached as a constant reminder of his failure. It felt sore and hot, and eventually Dean remembered how his mom would take care of his scrapped knees.

He drew himself a warm bath, pouring lots of soap into the tub. Dean stepped in and submerged himself completely under the water. Dean stifled a scream as the water stung his back. He waited in the water for as long as he could stand, before the pain made him sick to his stomach and he had to jump out of the tub. He went to his dad's first aid kit and took out the antiseptic cream. He rubbed it on all the cuts on his back that he could reach, pretending that the pain wasn't real. When he went back to drain the tub, he found the water stained pink from his blood.

Dean kept lathering on the antiseptic cream for a few days while he watched after Sammy. He ate food out of the fridge, making formula and just taking care of things.

On the seventh night, when food was running low and Dean was really starting to worry, John came home.

"Dean!" He called with a weird grin on his face as he stumbled through the door. Dean inhaled through his nose, and found his dad smelled funny, so he picked up a brown bottle from the fridge and brought it over to his dad.

"Thanks, boy. Hey Dean, guess what?" John prodded as he opened his beer.

"What, sir?" Dean's voice shook.

"I ganked the rest of those vamps. Every. Last. One. And do you know what that means, Dean?"

"No, sir."

"It means, boy, that I am feeling good. I'm in the mood for celebrating!" John walked over and grabbed Dean by the shoulder. Dean stayed quiet; he didn't understand what was happening, so he just shut his mouth and went limp in his father's, arms.

John dragged him over to the bed, and threw him into it, face down. Dean squeezed his eyes shut and clenched the muscles in his stomach. He knew that something bad was going to happen, but he couldn't say what.

He heard metal clanking against metal again, like he had the other night. But tonight, Dean also heard the sound of a zipper sliding down, and fabric rubbing against skin.

Dean felt his pajama pants and his underwear being pulled down, and he squeezed his eyes tighter. He felt sick to his stomach, and he felt tears threatening to spill down he cheeks, but he refused to cry, or even to make a sound. Even though Dean was just four years old, he reasoned that his father was not thinking straight; that whatever it was that made him smell funny was also making him do this. And for whatever reason, Dean knew that if he fought, this would all be much worse.

John was speaking now, but he wasn't making any sense. He kept mumbling things like "Mary" but most of the words he was saying were not discernible.

Suddenly, Dean felt something poking inside his ass. It was covered in something cold and it shoved inside him so quickly that he couldn't breathe. Soon, something else was thrust inside him alongside the first thing, and he was being scissored open. Dean's chest felt like it was being sat on by an elephant, and the pain was blinding. He tried to think of something else, anything else, but the pain was all consuming.

Whatever was inside Dean was soon removed, and he felt so much relief. _Thank goodness it's all over._

Then, something hard and hot and thick was shoved inside him and Dean couldn't breathe again. He could feel something hot slide down between his cheeks, and then Dean started crying.

"Daddy," Dean whimpered brokenly. In that moment, John slapped Dean brutally across his cheeks, like there was a momentary crack in this facade that John had built. Dean bit his lip as John continued to thrust unrelentingly into him, the pain making him nauseous.

Dean felt his eyelids get heavy, and his poor little heart thought _this is it, this is how I die._ John was digging his nails into Dean's hips, hard enough to draw blood. Dean thought hazily about if Sammy could hear him, and if he was upset.

"Mary, yes. Oh hun, you're so tight, so wet for me. Yes, you love it when I fuck you into your tight pussy. Oh, Mary!"

It was then that Dean felt something hot, thick, and wet shoot in his ass and the thing inside him slowly go limp. John pulled it out of Dean, and went to collapse on the couch. Dean burrowed himself under his covers, and passed out before he could think anything more of it.

**A/N**: First, I want to thank all the lovely people who have reviewed my story. It makes me so happy and a thousand times more likely to keep me wanting to write. So if you would keep adding fuel to my writer's fire, that would be much appreciated.

Please don't hate me for being so mean to Dean. I love him, I really, really do! For some reason, I just feel like this is how John would act, and I needed to write it, because I think John was one person when it came to Dean, and another when it came to Sam.

So, there are two ways I could I about this. This was as far as I was planning on making this, but I could add more to it, and make this more hurt/comfort and less angst-y. So let me know what everyone thinks. Thank you, and I love you all.


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